Hello everyone! How are you all today? Sorry this chapter took so long to get out, but I've had a busy week and haven't been able to be around when I wanted to post this chapter. Anyways, I found out today that I have to have surgery for my wisdom teeth. My first surgery will be October 22nd and will take out my bottom two, and the second one will be over spring break to remove my top two. The dentist won't touch them, because my bottom two have roots and are close to nerves in my jaw, while my top two are close to my sinuses. So without further stalling, enjoy the chapter!

"My feet hurttttttttt." Rideat complained.

"Yes Rideat, we know they do." James replied, as he pinched the bridge of his nose and continued to walk. The three from Beacon were currently escorting the Hunters from Achievement back to the school. While many were sad to go, most were glad to be returning to the safety of Vale's walls. The pack of fighters continued to carry on through the woods, despite the hyena's protest.

"IKEEEEEE."

"Yes… Rideat." Ike replied, equally exasperated.

"Can you carry me?"

"No, I can't Rideat."

"Why not?"

"Because it'd look weird?" Dakota pointed out.

"Because he already has to carry himself?" James added.

"Because I just don't want to?" Ike said.

"GUYYYYSSSS!" The Faunus complained.

"SHUT UP KID!" One of the Hunters in the group behind them called out.

"Who said that!?" Rideat yelled, as he quickly turned around and held up his fists. "Come on, say it to my face!" He said as the group of Hunters began to pass by him. "That's what I thought, just keep walking." He said, smugly.

"I said, shut up kid." One Hunter said as he past the teen.

"Oh, it was you then, take this then!" The Faunus then spun on his heel and punched at the man, only to realize his mistake. He had punched at the biggest man he could've. Standing at about two heads taller than the teen, the man wore a large amount of armor and had a giant sword hefted over one shoulder. In his other hand, was the teen's hand. "Oh, hello there." Rideat said weakly and added a forced laugh. "I'm Rideat." He then said, sticking out his prosthetic hand for the man to shake.

"Nice to meet you." The man replied, right before punching Rideat in the face, sending him sailing backwards and slamming into a tree.

"Damn it, Agni. Now someone has to carry him." Dakota said, more upset about having to carry Rideat than Agni hitting the teen.

"He'll be fine, he can walk." Agni replied.

"He's completely dazed." Ike replied bluntly.

"What makes you say that?" The big man asked.

"I can practically see the stars floating around his head." Blue replied.

"Did anyone get the license plate of that truck?" Rideat asked, sitting down with his back resting against the tree he had been punched into. His eyes wide and white and his head unable to stay in one place.

"No, we didn't." Agni replied, with a chuckle. The Faunus then collapsed from his sitting position to one on his side.

"And now he's unconscious." James said.

"Well, who's carrying him?" Dakota asked.

"Nose goes!" James called out, right before placing a finger on his nose. Before Ike could react, the rest of his friends did so as well. He then looked behind his to see the rest of the Hunters had placed their fingers on their noses as well.

"Damn it." The archer said.

-A Little While Later-

"What have you been eating, Rideat?" Ike complained to himself as he carried the still unconscious Faunus. Unknown to him though, a white hooded woman appeared from the forest around him and began walking next to him. "Stupid Agni, knocking a kid unconscious and then not carrying him. I should…"

"Hello, Ike." Summer said.

"AHH!" The teen yelled, flailing his arms for a moment and nearly dropping Rideat. "Summer, when'd you get here and don't ever sneak up on me like that again."

"I think a better question is why you're carrying a knocked out Faunus, who's currently drooling on your shoulder."

"Drooling on my…?" Ike said, before looking at his shoulder that Rideat's head was resting on. Sure enough, the Faunus was drooling on it. "Rideat!" He yelled out.

"Here, let me help." Summer said, as she pushed Rideat's head back.

"Maybe if I'm lucky he'll choke." Blue said as he wiped the drool off his shoulder. "Anyways, why're you here. Didn't you say you would meet us at Vale?"

"I did, but walking alone is boring and I wanted to talk to you a bit." The woman replied.

"About what?"

"Well, I thought it'd be nice to know a little about my daughter's boyfriend. Well, that and more about this world we live in."

"Let's start with the world then. As you know, we aren't in the real world, we're in my head. An alternate version of me, which was born when my brother died and is the embodiment of my anger and hatred, took over my head and currently has control of my body. The only way to regain my body is by killing the pieces of my alternate self. However, my alternate self, Vesh, also has control of the Grimm in my head. This means that we have to kill the Grimm to get to Vesh. There are a hundred different pieces of Vesh in my head, and killing all of them will let me take by my body and, hopefully, kill Vesh completely. The big issue is, the more pieces of Vesh we kill, the stronger they get. Meaning that our fights will only get harder and harder." Ike explained.

"Which is where the Hunters come in. You need us to be able to help you kill the pieces of Vesh."

"Exactly."

"So have much trouble have you been having with these fights recently."

"In a nutshell, they're difficult but not impossible. Adding this many Hunters will definitely help though and hopefully we can add more and more of us to the fight."

"So answer this to me, how did everyone else get here?" Summer asked.

"Well… you're all dead."

"I know that I'm dead, but why am I currently in your head."

"Well, because you're a memory. Everything here is a memory of the real world, including you."

"So this world is crafted from your memories?"

"Exactly."

"Interesting. I'm assuming your memory of me comes from Ruby?"

"You'd be correct."

"And how about the memory of everyone else?" Summer asked.

"History, graves, personal experiences, that kind of stuff."

"Now that that's out of the way, I should probably learn a bit about you."

"Well, what do you want to know?" The archer asked.

"My first question would be, what weapon do you use, but I already know that."

"You're just like Ruby." The teen said with a smile.

"What makes you say that?"

"Because the first day we got to Beacon, she obsessed about all of the weapons that the other students had. You're just as obsessed about weapons as she is, aren't you."

The woman in white laughed a little at hearing this, and said, "Yep, it's nice to see that she took after me in more ways than one. So tell me more about my daughter. Wow, that's something I never thought I'd say."

"Well, she looks almost exactly like you, she even has the same color of hair as you, except hers has a slight shade of red."

"She always did like red."

"I don't think there's been a time when she wasn't extremely cheerful. She's always willing to help, even if it means going out of her way, and that's something that other people start to pick up just from being around her. Even though she can be a little awkward when you first meet her, she's one of the most loyal friends someone can ever have. It always seems to amazes me that she seems to have limitless joy inside of her. Just getting to be around her has made me so infinitely happy, and she's really the biggest driving force behind me trying to get out of here and back into the real world. I guess I'm just lucky to be able to have her in my life." Ike said. He was looking upwards at the sky the entire time he spoke. As he finished, the teen looked over at Summer to see her with a wide and prideful smile on her face and wiping away a tear from her eye.

"Just hearing you say that lets me know she's in good hands with you around." The woman then wrapped her arms around the archer. "Thank you."

"I should really be thanking you." Ike replied as he wrapped an arm around her and led her forward for a few steps.

After a few moments of silence, Summer ended the hug and continued to walk forward. "It would probably be nice to hear about you now."

"Well, how much I tell really depends on how far into my past you want to go."

"Tell me everything. We have plenty of time."

"Well, I was born into a pretty average family. I had an older brother and two loving parents. My mother stayed at home and watched over me and my brother, while my father worked. At the time, James, my mother, and I all thought he worked at some dust company we'd never heard of. It wasn't until a few years later than James and I learned he worked in the Black Market. Anyways, one day my dad left for work and never came back. I can still remember that morning perfectly. My mom was making bacon and James and I were watching TV when my dad came down. He kissed my mom, grabbed a piece of bacon off of the pan, burnt his tongue on said bacon, said bye to us, and then walked out the door. After that, my mom just kind of gave up on life. She just stopped doing anything except for crying day in and day out, until she eventually died. That just left me and James to fend for ourselves. We probably would've been put into an orphanage if we hadn't just left our house before anyone discovered that we didn't have any parents anymore. So, my brother and I began living on the streets. That's where we first started to learn to fight. We had to learn so that we could protect ourselves, and even though we couldn't fight that well, we fought well enough to keep ourselves alive." Mers said. It was obvious that the story was beginning to become difficult for him to tell.

Before Summer could say anything, James entered the conversation. He wrapped his arm around Ike's shoulders and continued the story. "We looked out for each other. Ike was all I really had at that point of my life and I was all he had. Eventually, a man named Victor found us. He wasn't the first person that offered us a bed and food, but he was the first to offer a place where we could live and a place where we could learn to fight even better. I accepted his offer and took Ike with me. I still wonder if that was the right choice or not. Anyways, Victor trained us to become hitmen. It was brutal training that often had us ending our days battered and bruised, but we eventually finished. That's when we officially joined the organization. We were paid to track down people and kill them. Often times these weren't the most reputable people, but I don't think the police would've cared who they were if they ever caught us. Eventually we were hired to go after a guy named The Wessel. I died that night. The guy shot me and I died in that warehouse. It was a fitting end for me." James said with a sad smile.

"After that, I tried putting my past behind me and moving on with my life." Ike said, picking up his life story. "I quit the organization, joined Beacon, met Ruby and Yang, and was having a nice life. Then Victor showed up again. He began hunting me with everyone he could throw at me. I got so close to killing him not too long ago, but I missed my opportunity thanks to Vesh taking over my body. So, here I am. Trying to fight my way out of my own head so I can finally put my past behind me. Trying to fight my way out, so that I can finally kill the man that has tried to kill me. So that I can kill Victor. I'll just have to piece back what kind of life I'll have afterwards."

"You know, they say revenge is an act of passion. But at the same time, they say that vengeance is the act of turning anger in on yourself. On the surface it may be directed at someone else, but it is a surefire recipe for arresting emotional recovery. I would suggest not going after vengeance, but living your life as normally as you can." Summer said. "It was fighting that claimed my life, and I don't want to see it claim yours as well."

"I don't really think it's my choice if I get to live a normal life."

"You'll just have to see what happens once you get out of here. We should focus on one thing at a time for right now." Summer said.

"She's right, which means we don't need to be planning ahead until we know what happens in the present." James said.

"How much further?" Rideat wined from Ike's back.

"You're awake!?" The archer yelled.

"Yep."

"For how long!?"

"Ehh… Maybe a few minutes." The Faunus said.

"And you didn't tell me?"

"Nope."

"Why?" Blue asked.

"Because, it's so much more comfortable to be carried." Rideat said, as he rested his chin on Ike's shoulder. Well, he rested it for about a second until Ike threw him off of his back. "IKE!" Rideat wined from the ground that he was sitting on.

"CARRY YOURSELF!" Ike yelled back.

"Hey Agni…" The hyena said, as he sat on the ground and the big Hunter walked past him.

"Climb on. I guess I own you one."

"YAY!"

-Later-

"Welcome back!" Headmaster Nehn said, greeting the Mers brother and the Faunus. "And I see you've brought guests. That's fine, we have plenty of open rooms. Would've been nice if you asked first though." The Headmaster said, mumbling the last sentence. The Hunters simply walked past the Headmaster.

"Ahh, Headmaster Nehn. Good to see you." James said.

"Nice to see you didn't die." Nehn said. "It honestly amazes me that you three always seem to make it back in one piece."

"You're not the on one amazed." Rideat replied, as he approached the group.

"Anyways, we'd like you to meet Dakota and Zedong. They're the leaders of Achievement, the city where all of these Hunters come from. Dakota, Zedong, This is Headmaster Nehn."

"It's nice to meet you." Zedong said, extending his hand.

"Nice to meet you too." The headmaster said, shaking the elder's hand. "And Dakota, it's nice to see you again."

"Again?" James asked.

"Yes, Dakota trained at Beacon while Nehn was the headmaster." Ike said.

"She was one of my finest students and the leader of the top team in her class, DARC."

"DARC, was Agni on your team?" Rideat asked jokingly.

"Actually, yes." Dakota replied, stopping the Faunus's laughter.

"That must've been a scary team." The hyena mumbled to himself, as he began walking into Beacon.

"They were." Nehn answered. "Anyways, what brings you all here today?"

"We'll be helping in the fight against the Grimm." Dakota said confidently. "If you'll allow us to stay at Beacon for a while."

"I'll have to ask the other Headmasters, but I'm sure they'll allow it. Please, make yourselves at home."

"Thank you, Headmaster Nehn." Zedong said. "Now, I've heard you don't have any way of knowing if someone has died in combat or not. Now at Achievement we've found a way…" The elder said, as he led the Headmaster towards the halls of Beacon."

"I'd better go find my old room and set up camp. I don't think we'll be leaving any time soon." Dakota said, as she entered the building.

"Ya, a nap sounds nice right now. I'll see you later little bro." James said, as he followed Dakota.

"A nap in your room you mean." Dakota said.

"Well, I was thinking."

"Shut up, I already don't want to hear it." The Huntress said.

"Honey, come on."

"What did you call me!?" The sniper yelled, enraged.

"Nothing!" James replied with a fake smile on his face.

"Well then…" Ike said to himself as he stood in front of the entrance of Beacon. "This seems familiar, standing in front of Beacon by myself with everyone walking around me."

"What happened the last time this happened to you?" Summer asked from behind the archer.

"Your daughter exploded." Ike replied as he began to walking into the school.

"She had a meltdown on the first day?" Summer asked.

"No, she literally exploded a hole in front of the school! And there was some fire, and I think some ice?"

"Are you being sarcastic?" The woman asked.

"I wish."

I felt this chapter was kinda needed. I added a lot of things that I've been wanting to add for a while. Well, I don't have any news for the story, but be sure to go check out In The Wind, my original story, over on FictionPress. I'm working on the second chapter now and the story is a concept that I've been wanting to do for a while. I write under the same name over there too, if that helps you. Anyways, don't forget to leave a review or send me a PM so I can talk to you. I'll see you in the next chapter, bye!